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Ask HN: Simple little business - what should I call it?
I'm normally OK at this, but I'm struggling here! Anyone got any original ideas?
I deliver empty boxes to people's homes, they fill them up with their unwanted goods (small electricals etc.), I then collect, list and sell everything on eBay and pay them the proceeds (less commission) straight into their Paypal.
I'd eventually like to be able to sell direct on my own site, avoiding ebay.
It ideally needs to be a common TLD as the customers are unlikely to be tech-savvy.
Update: I didn't expect much attention from this so I kept it brief. Here's some more info since people seem interested in the business itself.
I'm not started yet - I just used the present tense for brevity above. I'm going to test the market over the next couple of weeks with a sample dropoff to 100 houses. I founded a student storage business [www.thebigspace.co.uk] 7 years ago and so I've got a good grasp of the logistics of collecting and moving boxes. I also have lots of empty boxes and storage space. Any thoughts on the viability of the business are also welcome...
- krschultz 16y agoEasyAuction DoorToSold
- AlexMuir 16y agoEasy Auction is long gone sadly.
- revorad 16y agoalexcart.com - it's available, go get it.
- AlexMuir 16y agolol, cheers. I'm not sure I want the whole thing built around my own name though! And, somewhat unbelievably, a good number of people seem to be able to spell my name wrong.
- rms 16y agoalexcart is 8 characters, that's pretty good...
- revorad 16y agoI'm sure Craig Newmark thought in the same way. It's just that people's names are memorable and given the way you are starting, the personal touch might be valuable. Remember, names can always change...
- jorangreef 16y agoIf you put your name on it, it forces you to make it work. It puts you on the line. Puts you out in front. Keeps it real. Keeps you from hiding behind branding paraphernalia.
- limmeau 16y agoHave you tried wordoid.com? (not as a name, but as a source of names).
- michael_dorfman 16y agowww.box-away.com is available. If you want to avoid the hyphen, you can go with www.MagicBoxAway.com, or use colored boxes, and go for www.BlueBoxAway.com (or GreenBoxAway, or YellowBoxAway, etc.)
- AlexMuir 16y agoColoured cardboard boxes cost a surprising amount extra (almost double). BrownBoxAway doesn't have the same ring to it. MagicBoxAway is pretty good though.
- astine 16y agoYes, but they look so sleek. Seriously, people will judge the trustworthiness of your company by the appearance of your boxes and the quality of your branding. I don't know the costs of the cardboard boxes you're looking at, but I suspect that the price difference might be worth it. Add a simple logo and you'll be golden. ...I like the 'redboxaway' because the color is the brightest, and because red and box are the same number of letters it leads itself to more logo options. There is a possible name clash with a popular video rental business though.
- AlexMuir 16y agoTo give an idea of price for boxes (a random fact, but maybe useful). A double-walled cardboard box measuring 18" x 12" x 12", with a logo and text in one colour, costs around 90p when ordering 1,500 at a time. They are suprisingly expensive. And that's with me collecting from the factory.
- kapauldo 16y agoI like box and away. Anything with auction available?
- kapauldo 16y agoAuctionbox ?
- AlexMuir 16y agothe .com is gone sadly.
- dools 16y agowww.packyes.com www.boxbyme.com www.packadoodle.com www.boxyboxing.com www.boxinthehand.com www.boxmule.com
- miked 16y agoHockBox.com
- thirdstation 16y agoclutterbin.com Think about what you're doing for people and maybe you'll get more ideas. You're helping people by making it easy to clean up their unwanted clutter and then magically, they get money and peace of mind because they're not surrounded by stuff they don't want :-)
- spxdcz 16y agoThis is the best suggestion so far, as other suggestions (like 'box') are neutral (emotionally), whereas 'clutter' lets the customer know that what you're doing is HELPING them remove things that are negative (emotionally speaking) in their house. If you added in a positive effect to this (think along the lines of cash4gold), so clutter4cash or something (it has some rhyming to it too, which has been proven to improve recall of product names), then you're onto something. [EDIT: or is that 'cash4clutter'?? I never know which way around the before/after should be!] [EDIT 2: PPS - great idea for a service!]
- spxdcz 16y agoThis is not a serious suggestion, but you could do a play-on-words for "Put your junk in my trunk"...
- AlexMuir 16y agocash4box.com
- AlexMuir 16y agobox2cash.com
- limmeau 16y agoSounds dangerously close to casino spam to me.
- AlexMuir 16y agoNot sure I follow you, can you elaborate?
- limmeau 16y agoThe word "cash" is the most descriptive word ("box" is a rather generic term) in those names. Apart from that, the names sound completely generic. They remind me of get-rich-quick schemes and of shady online casinos, which are all purely about putting money somewhere. Your business idea, as I understand it, is mostly about people getting rid of unused stuff, and paid for it, but without freezing their feet off in a fleamarket. I'd rather focus on that positive experience, because that is something online casinos don't have.
- cixa 16y agoDesiderata. Desiradata.
- edash 16y agoFromYourDoor.com (a play on "to your door") ByeByeBox.net (unfortunately .com is taken, but it's only parked)
- AlexMuir 16y agoI like ByeByeBox. FromYourDoor would be a great one for a taxi company.
- yodasan 16y agoHow about richrubbish.com?
- bgraves 16y agoI upvoted my favorite TLD on the page (clutterbin.com) However, I'm curious about your business model. 1. How much revenue are you bringing in? 2. What is the commission structure like? 3. How many customers do you have? 4. Where is your business located (generally, of course)? 5. Does this business model scale well? Thanks in advance, I know I'm prying but it seems very interesting. I've chatted with a friend of mine who tried the 'eBay drop-off center' business but it was difficult because people would drop off their junk and it took a lot of time to sort, research, post, and ship the items. If you've discovered a better way of making money from this process, I'd love to hear more about it.
- AlexMuir 16y agoI'm not started yet - I just used the present tense for brevity above. I'm going to test the market over the next couple of weeks with a sample dropoff. I founded a student storage business [http://www.thebigspace.co.uk http://www.thebigspace.co.uk] 7 years ago and so I've got a good grasp of the logistics of collecting and moving boxes. I also have lots of empty boxes. 1. Zero so far. 2. I'm going to start at 15% after selling costs (ebay fees and shipping) 3. I'll start by dropping boxes to 100 houses and see what I get back - if it works at that scale then I think it should scale up. 4. UK. 5. I hope so. I suspect it will because I can bulk up similar things and then ship them to the markets where they'll sell well. Eg. Old phones still fetch good money in Africa. XBox and Playstation games sell well in Eastern Europe. Likewise, DVDs are still in demand. I think the advantage over the dropshop model is: 1. Much more appealing for householders: I've got loads of stuff that just depreciating year by year. By the time I've found a box, boxed it up, found a dropshop, driven it there, and filled in the forms I could have sold it myself. This way you just pick the box up at your front door, walk round the house and fill it, write your email address on the box, and leave it back at the door. 2. Scalability: I can do this nationally by shipping inbound boxes for $7.50. I can also use a rep system, whereby local people (think Avon ladies) take on their area on a part time basis. 3. Low overhead: No premises. Centralised facility for sorting through things - ideally with the facility to simply enter a model number and condition for common items to generate a standard listing, without the need to write anything or photograph things. Drop me an email if you want - me@alexmuir.com
- olalonde 16y agoReminds me of cash4gold. I think a better business model would be to pay them directly for the box. The drawback is that you have to become good at evaluating the market value of what's inside the boxes.
- run4yourlives 16y agoYou could probably just pay them a standard amount for their "junk". Most people have no idea of the value of things that they are trying to get rid of.
- pbhjpbhj 16y ago>Most people have no idea of the value of things that they are trying to get rid of. Until they check ebay before getting rid of it. "You don't even need to check how much it's worth just $NAME.com and you're done!" (suggestion in the mail).
- AlexMuir 16y agoIt's a trust issue. This way, our interests are aligned, and people aren't going to think 'Hey, this might be worth something - I'll hang onto it'. I'm going to get the best price for their stuff, and they can see it. Cash4gold pay as little as they can get away with - I don't want to be 'exposed' in the scams section of the paper.
- olalonde 16y agoCash4gold is not a scam and they make a shit load of money. The trust issue in my opinion will lie in you walking away with people's stuff with no real incentive in getting the best price out of it since every sale is profit for you. Also, what will you do when an item doesn't sell after some time? Do you ship it back to its owner? Just think carefully about your business model because profit-sharing might not be the best way to go.
- astine 16y agoCash4Gold is a terrible investment. you can nearly always get a better price at your local pawn broker (or hell, eBay.) They may not technically be a scam, but they are still perceived as such and have a terrible reputation amongst customers.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- trizk 16y agoThrowAwayRecycler.com sounds like a good one. If you dont like it you can also try CashForYourJunk.com but some people might get the wrong idea.
- systemtrigger 16y agoAccording to nxdom these .coms are available: ridya, selldr, payrid, clutterz, easyrids.
- WesleyJohnson 16y agoI really like this idea. I'm curious on how you avoid the scenario of people thinking you're underselling how much you made on eBay? Or do you not see that as an issue because it's really unwanted stuff anyway, so any money made is a profit? That and you could potentially link them to the auction listing(s) for their items to see the progress. Maybe have policies that all auctions are $1 starts with no reserve and they get what they get?
- AlexMuir 16y agoThat's the plan - we'll link their boxes with ebay listings so they can follow it themselves if they want. It's totally transparent.
- J3L2404 16y agoA similar service - http://www.gazelle.com/ http://www.gazelle.com/
- jpastika 16y agobyebuybox.com and buybyebox.com are available.
- johnnyg 16y agosimplelittlebusiness.com
- amorphid 16y agoCaptainShiznit.com
- robbiem 16y agogetridofit.com
- jeffepp 16y agoI have the URL usedly.com that I would be willing to donate...
- AlexMuir 16y agoCheers - very good of you. For now I'm going to just work on the fundamentals before going for a permanent brand. It's easy to get tied down on a name, but if I can't make it profitable it's not going anywhere.
- JoeAltmaier 16y agoCleanHouseForMoney
- bigohms 16y agobyebyebox.com
- shareme 16y agoBSaleBGone
- wlievens 16y agoThis is absolutely genius. Please expand to Belgium pronto. I'd have no problem with a commission as high as 30%.
- ovi256 16y agoI had a friend that did exactly this in France starting in 2007. I didn't hear about it anymore a year later, so I'd say his venture ended, but I really am not sure. I can't remember the name and google doesn't find anything anymore, as anything touching eBay is SEO'd to high heaven.
- AlexMuir 16y agoI'd definitely be interested in talking to your friend. Feel free to pass on my email - me@alexmuir.com.
- shanes 16y agoHi Alex Here are my ideas. I apologize for mixing up the good ones with the stupid ones. TossitAndProfit BoxitAndHawkit FillPhilsBox RustyDustyMustyAndBling CashForYourStash OneMansTrash AnotherMansTreasure SloughOffYourToffStuff WrapYourCrap HunkOfPlunkForYourFunkyJunk KnickKnackBricABrac BarmyGitsKaboodles FackYerTackle LesMoore JackDawse LowellWatt SellDeezTingsMon TallyMansBananas MoolaNoFoola DoshForTosh TankitAndBankit
- AlexMuir 16y agoWhat a list! SloughOffYourToffStuff - I used to live in Slough, that made me chuckle. TossitAndProfit - as a marketing tool like CompareTheMeerkat would work very well.
- stiggz 16y agocash for trash, junk 2 cash, turn around crap, cleanup shop, garbage cash, fill it up, empty my trash... i dunno, anything that makes it seem like you're taking peoples unwanted stuff and giving them cash and is easy to remember. You can always have two names, one for collection, and the other for sales... for sales, use names like: valuable bits, hidden treasures, needle in a haystack, cheap electronics, etc. You get the idea.
- rakkhi 16y agotrashtocash.ly
- martialtiger 16y agobrownboxauctions.com discardedgoods.com brownboxgoodies.com Checked and all are available as of 2010-10-22 9am PST. On a side note, my younger bro was considering doing a student storage business. I'd like to hear any feedback suggestion you may have regarding it, if at all possible.
- qeorge 16y agoTheListBox.com ListByBox.com I wish droplister.com or something similar was available (your business is like dropshipping, but in reverse). Good luck, its a great idea!
- eavc 16y agoUnPackage.com With spelling of Un-Package in normal copy and also buying Un-Package.com to redirect. Probably get Un-Packages.com and UnPackages.com too until you're sure whether you want the verb or the noun as your main focus. ----begin sample copy---- Introducing Un-Packages -- a greener, easier, and more lucrative way to get rid of things you don't want. It's just as fun and easy as buying something online, but in reverse! 1. Put something in a box. 2. Put it outside. 3. Wait for pick-up. 4. Receive money a few days later. 5. Decide what you want to do with your extra money. It's really that easy. Request an Un-Package today and have less clutter and more money tomorrow. _______ end copy ______ EDIT/OFF-TOPIC: Incidentally, I enjoy coming up with names for things and have done it successfully for friends' websites and businesses in the past, but I've never made any money off of it. I've flirted with charging for a service like this in the past, but I've never gone through with it. If anyone would like a few ideas, I'd be glad to spend a little time on it for either no charge or for an optional gratuity in return for a winner.
- eavc 16y agoFurthermore, with the "package" concept, you can take it beyond your locale if and when the economics and logistics are right. I'd send you an unpackage tomorrow if you'd take it.
- AlexMuir 16y agoI'll take it if you're in the UK. You don't have to send it - I'll arrange a courier to collect it. Drop me an email: me@alexmuir.com
- pbhjpbhj 16y agoThis does make me think that you could use the up front cost of sending the package to deter timewasters and filter for quality. If you send a courier for a box of stuff then how're you going to stop people putting excess rubbish out in your boxes and having it collected? You'll be like a high-class litter collector that saves people a trip to the skip (once). If you get people to pay to send the box to you then you could refund that payment when any item sells? This would encourage people to send stuff that will actually sell. The postage charge could still be made for your own collections and wouldn't have to be the full charge.
- tcarnell 16y agoNice idea, how about: MoneyForOldRope.co.uk
- user24 16y agodude, that's a great idea. I've never sold anything on ebay because I can't be bothered with the setup and management. You're providing ebay outsourcing. that's awesome. Where do I sign up? I have a box of crap right next to me waiting for your address. (I'm in the UK)
- AlexMuir 16y agoAmazing - I literally had this idea just before lunch. I've dropped you an email with the details. For anyone else in the UK, I'm happy to order a courier to collect your box from you. Shipping (£6 I think) will be deducted from the proceeds of sale. For now drop me an email - me@alexmuir.com. At this rate I'll have an IPO on Monday.
- kashif 16y agounclutter
- og1 16y agoLike the idea. Here are a couple names that came to mind hoardsale, hoardbox, tidycrate, shipsold, sendsold, auctionboxx
- AlexMuir 16y agoFollow my progress on Twitter: @box2cash (I'm not dead set on this name at all, I just need something to go at) I'm in lockdown over the weekend working on this.
- covercash 16y agoInteresting, I've recently been doing something similar with friends and family but with a charitable twist... They donate their unused electronics (iPhone, Blackberry, iPods, etc) to me and I give them away to people who need them in exchange for community service hours. The goal is to get people involved with the community as well as recycle used electronics that would otherwise sit in a drawer for years and eventually wind up in a landfill. So far I've used craigslist to give away an original 5gb iPod, iPhone 3g and 15" Macbook Pro battery in exchange for ~40 hours worth of community service (Habitat for Humanity and soup kitchens). I've been tossing around the idea of turning this into a non profit so that donations can be tax deductible. It would be nice to have a monetary incentive to donate used electronics in addition to the feel-good karma incentive. Right now I'm wrapping up a few projects and hope to dig into this idea a little deeper in the next week or so (come up with a name, look into what it takes to become a 501(c)(3), list some more items that have been donated, etc). When I do that, I'm definitely going to refer back to this thread for some ideas!
- pavel_lishin 16y agoI am interested in your business idea, but by the time you get it off the ground, I'll have thrown most of my shit away, since I'm moving. :/
- pbhjpbhj 16y agoIf you're in the UK he said, http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1820423 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1820423, you can send it now (or maybe tomorrow, it's late). Not soon enough?
- pavel_lishin 16y agoNope, Dallas, TX. :(
- smarterchild 16y agoOff the name topic, but I've been looking for this for months! I imagine the business margins (at least starting off) would resemble a pawn shop or consignment shop. Have you looked into those? I hope it works. Tell me if you launch (in the states)!
- tomotomo 16y agoEmptyCloset I also want to suggest http://www.needanym.com/ http://www.needanym.com/ for collecting potential names for projects/companies/sites in a structured way for free.
- AlexMuir 16y agoI've got a blog up to track my progress. It's at http://www.box2cash.com/blog http://www.box2cash.com/blog
- codeslush 16y agoA little late to the conversation here, but I have a domain that I think would be a pretty good fit. I originally registered for a very different purpose. I don't expect to renew it in 2011. TheProfitPalette.com Clearly, you've received a lot of feedback with a lot of good ideas. If you want this domain because it is just that good (haha) then let me know. Best wishes for your success.
- AlexMuir 16y agoThanks, good of you to offer. I'm sticking with box2cash.com for now, at least until I can test the concept.